3 Cs of Sick Time Planning: Creative, Considerate and Cost-Effective

3 Cs of Sick Time Planning During COVID-19: Creative, Considerate and Cost-Effective

Public and private employers have always had distinct differences in how they navigate workplace policies, compensations and supports around sick leave. These days, COVID-19 is adding yet another element to consider. If you are a full time federal, provincial or municipal employee at any level or you work for a large organization with comprehensive benefits, you already know you are entitled to a certain amount of paid sick leave each year. And, depending on what those circumstances are, you also may be eligible for further supports should your illness extend beyond your sick leave entitlements. In general, if you work for a public employer, you can rest assured if get sick you have a cushion and are “safe”

While the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted sick leave and compensation in all organizations, this blog focuses on smaller private businesses and employers who are now faced with the challenge of planning for and funding sick leaves amidst declining revenues and increasing staffing costs as they begin to reopen. With strict zero tolerance in the workplace for showing up with any symptoms of illness (WorkSafeBC), it is critical for employers to expect and plan for increases in sick leave before the predicted second wave of COVID-19 hits. In particular, this means contingency planning for the following areas:

1.     Funding for both sick leave and any extra coverage required to maintain services and outputs.

2.     Staffing substitutions (a.k.a. short-term, temporary succession planning) to ensure coverage at all levels and minimize disruption to core functions and services.

To ensure that your business or organization has what it needs to support staff who are sick and those still at work, let the 3 Cs of sick time planning inform your next steps. Because each workplace is unique, this is not meant to be prescriptive, but rather a guide to keep in mind when establishing what will work best for you.

GET CREATIVE

If you are a small business, you are well versed in the art of creative responses to problems, so don’t be afraid to get creative with your sick leave planning in the face of the pandemic. If money is already tight and you don’t have a policy of paid sick leave, push yourself to think outside the box.

For example, maybe you request an all-staff meeting to generate ideas on how you can all support each other when someone gets sick and is unable to come to work and together you come up with a list of staff who are willing to cover and be compensated in lieu time so that the staff member who is ill can continue to be paid. Many staff have fewer extracurriculars scheduled and may be more flexible than usual, so asking for volunteers who can swap shifts on short notice with others who fall ill is a good place to start.

BE CONSIDERATE

Next, ensure that all your planning is underpinned by careful consideration of the needs to have a safe, supported workplace for your staff and the needs of your organization to stay in business and resolve to get creative when it seems the two cannot be met simultaneously. Because they can. And they have to – public safety protocols demand it. Being considerate also means communicating to all staff that you have their backs if they think they are ill, no matter what it turns out to be in the end, and that you support and trust their decision to stay home always.

STAY COST EFFECTIVE

 The final C of getting really cost effective in your planning will also help to keep doors open and employees safe. Where can you cut spending in order to have extra sick leave funding available? Which staff members are willing and able to train in other areas now so that they can jump into different functions at times of need in the future? Do staff have other skills sets and experience already that enable them to pivot as/when needed, with no extra training required?

Something we have appreciated about our federal leadership during this time is how quickly it rushed to get financial aid to Canadians who needed it, stating that now was not the time to worry about that tiny minority of people who might abuse it. We believe all employers and managers need to take this same attitude toward sick time and leave in the workplace. We know people are going to need it, they will have to take it, and we must do everything we can to enable and support it. To best position yourself and your teams to weather whatever comes next, don’t wait – start planning now.

Leading From Home: What Managers Need to Think About

By now most leaders are getting into the swing of things working from home. We have all made it through the initial phases of an unexpected remote work arrangement and kept our teams safe in the process. Some of us may have even figured out (maybe only by trial and error, but it still counts) how to keep our teams engaged and motivated working remotely.    

But it’s one thing to lead a remote team on a temporary basis. What’s now becoming clear is that this “new normal” is likely here for longer than we’d hoped. Though in many places we are beginning to see a loosening of restrictions, we also know that leaders in every industry are being called to re-evaluate what work looks like. In many cases, continuing to work at home just makes more sense than asking staff to come back to the office. 

If that’s your business, and you’re considering making remote work a longer-term arrangement, there are a few crucial elements to consider in more depth. 

The first is continuing to stay flexible, while recognizing that new schedules need to be sustainable longer term now. This means collaborating with staff to balance the needs of the business with the demands of their home life. Work with your team members so that work hours are sustainable for them and fit their lives. As a leader, it’s your responsibility to co-create realistic schedules that meet the needs of the business while accommodating the lives of your team members. For example, team members might need to schedule meetings around nap times, and build in extra breaks throughout the day. As long as the work gets done, it’s time to loosen up restrictions about when the work gets done. 

 Mention the words “occupational health and safety” (especially right now) and most leaders are less than excited. But, a second crucial work from home consideration is workplace safety. Even though employees might not be in the office anymore, their safety and wellbeing while working remotely is still something you need to think about as an employer. Their home is an extension of the workplace, which means making sure there are policies and supports in place to address accident reporting, ergonomics, and working alone concerns. The good news is that WorkSafe BC has work from home guides, resources and checklists for leaders, so there’s no need to start from scratch.

A third consideration is accountability. When people are physically present in the same space, measuring contribution and outputs is relatively easy. But remote accountability goes beyond setting and following through on project plans and timelines that have always been part of a leader’s job description. Building a culture of accountability while working at home is a bigger “ask” that involves a leap of faith on the part of managers. Leaders of remote teams must truly learn to trust their employees will deliver, while still providing enough support to them in the form of check-points, resources, and nudges. This means formalizing and improving on systems for accountability, while increasing touch points so that everyone on the team is in the loop on expectations and knows what they’re responsible for (leaders included). 

To accomplish this, coaching is an invaluable tool in fostering accountability. Get any issues out into the open pre-emptively by asking questions like “What challenges are you facing right now?” or “Are there any obstacles you can anticipate with this?” or “What can I do to support you on this project?” 

Not sure what a coaching approach looks like or where to start? Reach out to discuss, as we’re happy to share some ideas with you.  

What Have You Done for your Employee Handbook Lately?

We spend countless hours generating documents to support us with working better, or more efficiently, as a team and then we promptly forget about them. We forget to update them, we forget to use them and eventually we forget why we made them in the first place.

Employee handbooks are a classic example of a key document that ends up collecting ‘digital dust’ yet is vital to every workplace. If you want your employee handbook to function as a real living document here are 7 simple tips to bring your handbook to life:

1.      Clarify what you want from your handbook: do you actually want an employee handbook or an operations manual? These two documents are often get confused for one other. Handbooks are designed to introduce your staff to the organization and the company’s culture, including your key expectations of staff.  They are not intended to outline every rule, policy or guideline the organization has.

2.      Use your handbook to introduce your Culture and the history of your company – where you are now, how you came to be and where you want to go. Let the introduction to the manual make your team feel excited about, and grounded in, the company’s vision and values.

3.      Be Common: using language common to your organization makes your handbook accessible. This means avoiding ‘HR speak’ (yes, this is a thing). Your handbook will be most effective if you use language that reflects your work culture. For example, many tech companies use very informal, colloquial and work-specific language in their every day.

4.      Get Clear: employee handbooks should address the five w’s - who/what/when/where/why and how. This means it needs to be clear and accessible and describe things that are relevant to the employee about the organization. This is your opportunity to set the tone of your dialogues with employees. You want your employees to read this document and use it so that you can rely on it to hold them accountable.

5.      Communicate with your staff by reviewing your handbook in person. This eases the onboarding process and informs a conversation about your culture and its expectations.

6.      Stay Current by keeping your manual updated and ensure all employees know when there are changes to the handbook. Offer your in-person availability on request to review any changes or answer questions and make sure they sign-off on understanding the changes.

7.      Handbooks are your opportunity to be Creative. A handbook can be quirky – make it original! Don’t pull other companies’ items off the Internet and stick them in a manual or include policies and procedures that your company doesn't adhere to. Remember, if you don’t use it you lose it - its really tricky to hold staff to a standard you don’t embody or enforce.  All content in your handbook should be well thought out and really explain the expectations for everyone and the parameters for their workplace.

Here is an example of a handbook I love: Valve Handbook.

See, it really can be fun!

In the Event of an Emergency

Lately I have been doing succession planning with most organisations I work with. This month alone, I am working with 3 companies doing various succession plans 1) with a leader to support with the departing of a staff member and the work they are leaving behind, 2) succession planning with staff, ED, and Board and 3) group leadership development with a tech company leadership team.

Succession planning doesn’t have to be complicated, but it does help to get a consultant into your workplace to support you. One of the things you can begin immediately is to future-proof your workplace by being in a continuous mode of knowledge transfer. In other words, don’t wait for the day when one of your team members calls in rich and quits or moves to Australia to become an ultra-minimalist – start knowledge transfer processes and succession planning now.

Having good documentation in place and building a culture of knowledge transfer supports with retaining information inside your organisation. It ensures in the event of a staffing emergency you can continue your day to day operations smoothly.

This can be is done through:

After Action Reviews: These debriefings are a way to capture experiences, what worked well, what needs improvement, and what can be done differently next time so others can learn from those experiences. It allows a leadership team to share learnings with other program leaders and departments.

Creation of Job Aids: These are tools that help people perform tasks accurately and could be built off best practises. They include things such as checklists or decision tree diagrams that provide specific concrete information and serve as a quick reference guide. Job Aids help with knowledge transfer and also improve on-boarding. Job aids  ensure key processes and functions do not just live inside people’s heads.

Mentoring (formal & informal): In mentoring, an experienced skilled person (mentor) is paired with a lesser skilled or experienced person (mentee), with the goal of developing or strengthening the competencies of the mentee. Mentorship programs support with leadership development, succession planning and on the job training (win-win-win!)

Why succession plan? Replacement hiring is a reactive process to a staffing emergency to fill an immediate need, whereas succession planning is proactive and works to address the need before it exists. By having a succession plan in place, companies save time (and dollars) through building internal capacity and knowledge. No emergencies here.